


Quiet Time

by thawrecka



Category: Buffy the Vampire Slayer
Genre: M/M, vague and creepy weirdness
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-01-31
Updated: 2004-01-31
Packaged: 2017-11-20 04:23:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 815
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/581266
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thawrecka/pseuds/thawrecka
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Oz came to Giles for help. Giles is refining his technique.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Quiet Time

**Author's Note:**

> post-Chosen, Giles/Oz and the shadow of Willow
> 
> for the Oz ficathon

Oz leans against the window and the light washes over him, making him look pale like an angel. His fingers, the nails a royal blue, trail over the glass aimlessly, leaving smudges all over the window. His eyes are almost closed against the sun. This afternoon it moves in waves across his face.

He is still small and quiet, more than he should be, but for all that his presence is relaxing rather than worrying.

A month ago when Oz found Giles Oz had looked thin, scared, tired and run down. Now, he is becoming something again, slowly but surely.

 

A thin slip of a man on the doorstep. Ratty hair, dark roots. Darkness around the eyes. A twist of the lips as if trying to remember how to smile.

"Hello." Polite and understated as ever.

Shock. Then, "Oz, do come in."

His eyes had darted around, suspicious of the furniture and the shadows in the walls. His skin seemed sallow and his body gaunt, as if desperation had scooped out his insides.

There was tea, warm and revitalising. It slipped around Giles' mouth, stinging hot against his tongue. A slight hiss.

Oz sat on the floor, cross-legged, mug in hands. Stared down into the tea as if it held the answers to the universe.

A deep breath. "I have a problem." A pause.

"You have to be more specific than that."

And so he was. He spoke at length, clear about the ways he had transgressed against mankind, asking for help. It was all so much easier than it had been with Willow.

 

Oz has been staying at Giles' house a month, resting, eating his food and borrowing his albums. Mostly, Oz is unobtrusive. He fits neatly into corners and has a way of blending into the walls.

"Come away from the window," Giles says. It is a suggestion rather than a command.

Oz looks towards Giles, startled, as if just remembering the world beyond the window existed.

Crossing the room Oz moves slowly, like through water. (Willow had moved like a fire through a forest.)

 

Oz often tapped out tunes with his fingers. On the walls. On the furniture. On his thighs. He hummed complacently when he worked.

When he was too tired to pick out a tune, Giles would put on the radio for him to have something to hum to. (There had been something about Willow that hummed but it wasn't her voice.)

There was something strangely empty about the moments when Oz didn't know what to say.

"I didn't mean to. I was tired. And hungry."

Others have been angry, ecstatic or complacent. Black marks on anyone's soul.

"We all have our demons, our cross to bear." And he looked at his sleeve where it hid the tattoo. Remembered the feeling like bugs under his skin.

"Admitting it is the first step." Voice dry like desert sand. Oz's eyes hinted at laughter.

 

Oz sits down on the arm of Giles' chair. He doesn't say anything, just looks at Giles with something approaching calm. Oz often looks apathetic or emotionless, but it's clear that he's not.

"Would you like to read something?" Giles asks. He remembers what books had meant to him when his skin had itched with the guilt.

There are books stacked on the coffee table in several untidy piles. Oz reaches a hand out and closes his eyes, letting blind fingers choose a book. His hands hover for a moment over Stranger in a Strange Land, before closing around the book. He lifts it up, testing its heavy weight in his hands.

Oz opens his eyes, looks at the book in his hand and says, "Never would have thought."

He settles in to reading, still perched on the arm of the chair.

 

Oz cooked without any fuss. He could spin out many dishes from around the world. It seemed he put some of every condiment that Giles had into the food. It was definitely edible, often surprising. There were always leftovers, which they diligently heated up the next morning for breakfast.

A smudge of sauce on his lower lip. Darting pink tongue.

Giles had wanted to pretend he wasn't tempted. Oz, however, didn't bother with this.

Oz leaned in, no ceremony to it. Just a soft press of lips to lips. Soft and simple and warm.

They kissed for minutes without end, breathing into each other's mouths, until everything began to swim in Giles' head.

In time the kissing stopped and Oz left the room. No more was said about it until the next time they kissed.

Willow had preferred making sandwiches.

 

And so Oz reads quietly beside him.

Oz is somewhat more substantial than when he came here, and less than he will be when he leaves. He has been re-set, like a broken bone and Giles will put back together, heal him. It's what Giles does.


End file.
